


I could get used to this baby

by little_miss_chaos



Category: Marvel, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Banter, Bickering, Canon-Typical Violence, Clint and Natasha are good bros, Gen, I just needed them to sass the heck out of each other, Steve Rogers also has a heart, Tony Stark Has A Heart, a little bit of swearing, getting stranded in the middle of nowhere, so I wrote it, with a baby
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-20
Updated: 2019-08-20
Packaged: 2020-09-19 03:41:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20324494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/little_miss_chaos/pseuds/little_miss_chaos
Summary: Steve Rogers can handle a lot of things. Being team captain to a bunch of misfits. Fighting bad guys on a near-daily basis. Appearing in front of the press and smiling until his cheeks hurt. No problem at all.But getting stranded in an abandoned cabin in the middle of nowhere with Tony Stark? Definitely not up his alley.And to top things off Stark isn't the only infant he has to deal with.





	I could get used to this baby

**Author's Note:**

> I needed banter, I needed bickering and for the hell of it I added a baby to the mix because I wanted Steve to exude his knowledge on infant care from the 1940s :)
> 
> There are two instances probably worth a trigger warning that I didn't put in the tags because I only mention both in passing, like two sentences each at the max. If you think that might make you uncomfortable and/or if you want full disclosure before reading, please see the end notes!

Steve Rogers was used to being on the run, even before his time as Captain America. He knew what to expect, most of the time at least. That a simple mission revolving around HYDRA and their latest stunt would turn into _this_, put things on a whole new level, though, even for him.

He had taken into account that they might get split up. They had emergency plans for that, silent codes on where to reassemble after. He had taken into account that some of them might get injured. They had all been annoyed when he’d insisted they carried first aid dressings with them at all times, but through all the complaining most of them had done it anyway which was rather satisfying he had to say. He even had taken into account that some of their tech could get destroyed on the way. Tony always had a contingency plan for those situations, really.

What he hadn't counted on was being stuck with a baby. And no, he wasn't talking about Tony Stark here. Though he was whining like one, too.

"Urgh, no no no no no, don't you just drop-"

Steve untangled his arm from where Tony's fingers had clawed into his shoulder for support and let him fall down on the couch unceremoniously. The sound Tony made was somewhere between a huff and a groan from suppressed pain.

“-me off here like some kind of punching bag,” he hissed out the rest of the sentence between clenched teeth.

“You brought this on yourself, destroying all our tech and dropping us in the middle of nowhere!”

“Oh, now it’s _my_ fault HYDRA decided to attack us with some kind of super-secretly developed weapon of mass destruction?”

“No, but you were the one to blow up your suit while you were carrying me and stranding us here in the middle of nowhere!”

Tony was nothing short of livid when he answered, pronounced every word carefully. “There was a bomb strapped to our backs if you can recall!”

“I do recall! I also recall that I was in the middle of dismantling it when you decided it wasn’t worth the effort and let them blow up your whole suit in the process!”

“There wasn’t enough time to get-“

And then Steve heard it.

“Shh!”

Or thought he’d heard it. But with Tony still talking he couldn’t make out anything distinct.

“Oh, don’t shush me!” He obviously wanted to say more, but Steve needed to _hear, _damn it.

“Shut up, Stark.”

And somehow that seemed to hold something of something or another, Steve wasn’t sure. He was just glad that Tony finally seemed to get on board with letting him do his job, though he didn’t shut up. But what had Steve expected, really?

“What are you on ab-?”

“Ssshh!” Steve repeated more insistently, even held up a finger, maybe then Tony would understand better. The man just scrunched up his face though and shrugged, clearly _not_ understanding what Steve was trying to get at here.

Until the crying got louder, more wailing. More heartbreaking.

Tony’s face slackened. “Whoa, that’s not a-“

“Would you be quiet for a second?” Maybe Steve’s tone was a little harsher than it needed to be, but Tony was starting to get on his nerves with his constant babbling.

With a motion that was supposed to say _stay put _(not that Tony could do anything else at the moment, mind you) Steve made his way over to the only door the room gave way to. He threw another look over his shoulder to make sure Tony had indeed stayed put before he carefully reached for the handle and pushed the door open.

What he found baffled him. First because _what the fuck_, and second because _who the hell left a baby behind?_

The third thing that popped into his mind was that this was a trap. Somehow. Had to be. Steve couldn’t imagine that a mother left behind a child so small.

He took in the small bathroom, but for the life of him couldn’t find anything suspicious. Taking a deep breath, he took one step into the bathroom, expecting the worst. What he got, though, was only more wailing. His mind set, he took another step. Still, nothing happened. The baby’s breath hitched in its heartbreaking crying, clearly in a lot of distress. Steve didn’t let that distract him. He couldn’t be, though it was hard to concentrate. He hadn’t figured that one small being could make that much noise, but here he was experiencing it live.

Slowly, scouting the whole room for any inconsistencies that would reveal this as a trap, Steve made his way over to the bathtub where the baby had been left wrapped in a blanket. Any second now something would happen, he was sure of it. But even as he bent down to take in the baby more closely, there was nothing.

Their little arms were flailing about, still crying and kicking and screaming. Steve already bent down to pick the baby up when a voice startled him to straighten his back again.

“Congratulations,” Tony said, lurking behind him. “It’s a boy.”

Steve almost planted a punch to his chin with his shoulder at the voice suddenly so close to him, but -sadly- stopped himself just in time when he realized who it was. A stern look on his face he turned halfway around to glare at Tony.

“Didn’t I tell you to stay put?”

“You told me nothing,” Tony tried to defend himself, but Steve decidedly did not have time for that. He simply grabbed the other man and under his loud protests got him back onto the couch.

“Your leg’s most likely broken. How about you don’t use it until I’ve had a chance to check it over?”

“How about you leave me alone and shut up the squaller instead?”

The term wasn’t that far off. The baby was screaming and bawling and loudly expressed being generally unhappy. He threw Tony another glare, this time hopefully with more effect in keeping him put, and faced the situation in the bathroom again.

As he stood at the bathtub, looking down at the baby, Steve frowned and tried to remember every scrap of knowledge about babies he got to know from his mother’s stories from the hospital. Every little thing she ever told him about himself and how she’d tamed him down when he was small. He still didn’t feel ready to pick up the screaming bundle. Steve also knew, though, that he wouldn’t entrust Tony Stark with that baby, so he had no other choice but to man up.

With a resolute huff he finally bent down and held the bawler against his chest with gentle hands. The baby, a boy as Tony had so helpfully pointed out by the color scheme he was wearing, clearly didn’t like it. He flailed his arms about and hit Steve a couple of times in the face in his distress until Steve managed to rearrange him so his face was out of the little arms’ range.

Steve felt himself growl and the baby stilled noticeably. At least for a heartbeat before he started crying again, wetting Steve’s uniform. He grimaced and grabbed a towel to separate them. With a satisfied huff, he turned to face the baby.

“Okay, you have to work with me here…” Out of the corner of his eye he caught sight of a golden wristband stating a name and a date. “…Lucas.”

Talking didn’t calm him down any more than Steve’s previous attempts, though he liked to think being close to another human being had helped the baby a little. He remembered his ma talking about closeness and infant care, but couldn’t really remember the specifics now. Not that he’d ever thought he’d need that knowledge in an emergency situation like this.

From the other room he heard a relieved sounding groan. Apparently the baby had calmed down enough for Tony’s tastes. Or he’d finally passed out from the pain of his injuries. Steve would’ve preferred the second option, but had a feeling he wasn’t going to be that lucky.

In his arms the baby -Lucas- calmed down further, getting to know and trust Steve as a big human who was going to take care of him. At least Steve hoped so. Because there was no sign that his parents were coming around anytime soon.

Lost in his thoughts about abandoned children Steve shifted Lucas around and repositioned him in the crook of his arm. The baby’s breaths were still pretty labored and he watched Steve with big eyes, almost too still for a little human being. At least he wasn’t trying to get free from Steve’s grip anymore. Feeling on safe ground again for the moment Steve, mindful of the little creature in his arms, bent down to retrieve the blanket from the bathtub and made his way back into the other room.

“Wow. The most domestic American picture I’ve seen in my entire life,” Tony commented when he peeked out from where he’d covered his face with his arm. Steve threw him a leveled gaze and unceremoniously dropped Lucas’ blanket on the floor.

“Captain America holding a baby.” Tony let his arm fall, making it dangle over the edge of the couch as he watched Steve putting the calmed down baby on top of the blanket.

“You’re much to chipper for a guy with a broken leg.”

“My money’s on not broken,” Tony replied, but his smirk was a little askew. He clearly was in pain and couldn’t manage to disguise it fully, though he desperately tried to. “But please, knock yourself out.” He generously motioned to the other end of the couch where he’d settled his legs.

“I will. Along with you if make too much of a fuss.”

Theatrically Tony clutched at his heart. “Ouch, you wound me, Captain.”

Steve only commented that with a gentle pet to Tony’s knee which caused him to groan loudly. “I’d say that sounds like a broken leg. You want me to knock you out before I take another look?”

With clenched teeth Tony pressed out a no and went to grab the edges of the couch while Steve got to work. He’d known that that had been mean, but sometimes mean was the only way to shut Tony up. And right now, Steve needed quiet.

He worked silently, bringing up all his knowledge on combat medicine, while trying to assess the damage to Tony’s body. The leg was definitely broken, Steve could even feel that. Other than that he’d gotten lucky. Only a couple of bruises that were already darkening, and some superficial cuts. Nothing too serious. The leg was definitely the worst.

He had gotten rid of their entire tech for reasons Steve still couldn’t fathom. After all, Tony was the one who always claimed that Stark tech was unfaultable and more importantly, unhackable. That they were now stranded, bare of any possible weapons safe for Steve’s shield, clearly spoke a different language. Steve’s uniform was probably the most technologically advanced piece in their possession right now. Steve wanted to huff. Wanted to, but in the end didn’t.

When he was finished, he told Tony to stay put while he got outside to search for a couple of suitable branches to stabilize his lower leg. When he came back Tony was eyeing the baby suspiciously.

“The brat is whining.”

Steve heard that Lucas was getting restless again, but couldn’t refrain from commenting, “Yeah, I could hear you groaning from outside.” He smirked. Tony wasn’t so impressed and only glared at him as Steve splinted the leg in a makeshift fashion. Tony held still and his mouth for the rest of the procedure and when Steve was finished mumbled out a low ‘thanks’.

Steve took it without rubbing any more salt into the wound and instead proclaimed that he would scout out the place. Tony was told to stay put and put his leg up to prevent swelling.

He still wasn’t convinced that this wasn’t a trap. However, this was still a baby (at least as far as he could see, a perfectly human, although slightly unhappy one) and it needed care. To Steve’s utter relief he found two boxes of formula in one of the cabinets, along with a couple of cans. Those were a bonus, really. He’d managed to get a group of seven including himself fed in the forests of Italy in the winter of 1945, he could manage Tony and himself in a heartbeat. What he had actually worried about was getting the baby properly fed. But with the boxes of formula, they surely would be able to bridge the time until the other Avengers found them.

Speaking of the baby: Lucas was obviously getting restless again and Steve was two arms deep in raiding the house of a little family for food. Which only left him one option.

“Can you look after the baby?”

“I thought I wasn’t supposed to move?” Tony retorted rather snappishly. Steve wanted to roll his eyes, but only looked at the ceiling for help in the end. With a sigh, he abandoned the search for more food, went over to pick up Lucas and gently lay him down on the chest of a very surprised Tony Stark who obviously hadn’t counted on Steve actually dumping the baby in his lap, before returning to search the other cabinets and wardrobes.

“Uhm,” he heard Tony mumble in the background. “What am I supposed to do with…?”

Steve didn’t look at him, but answered nonetheless. “Just let him lie on your chest for a couple of minutes until he calms down.”

“Uh-huh.” He didn’t sound convinced, but Steve was busy and Lucas was already quieting down again, so he supposed they were okay, at least for the moment.

“Um… Steve?” Tony asked after Steve had managed to systematically search the room and take stock of their supplies. He’d even found a couple of pain killers. Those would surely help Tony sleep tonight. They should be good for a couple of days; for a cabin lain so remotely in the countryside with no apparent means of transport outside this place was surprisingly well stocked. The only thing that worried Steve a little was the lack of supplies for a newborn. According to the delicate bracelet around Lucas’ left wrist he was only two months old.

“Rogers!”

Tony’s hiss drew his attention towards the man. He had raised his hands as if he was held at gunpoint, his gaze intently trained on the baby. By the rise and fall of his chest Steve saw his breathing was elevated, but he couldn’t figure out why. When he asked the other man about it, Tony threw him a strange look.

“I didn’t do anything! He suddenly stopped moving! What, what - what am I supposed to do?”

Steve snorted, covered the lower half of his face up with a hand to hide his smile behind. “I thought you were a genius, Stark.”

“I am!” he hissed. “But this isn’t rocket science which I could do in a heartbeat! _This_ is…” His voice trailed off, but the frantic look in his eyes stayed. Steve took pity on him.

“He’s sleeping, Tony.”

As he made his way over to crouch beside them he smirked. The baby was indeed sleeping on Tony’s chest, looking content and at peace. Steve couldn’t help raising his hand and traced a finger softly across his cheek, evicting a smile from the small creature before tossing Tony a couple of pills that the other man took without hesitation.

“How long will it sleep?” Tony exaggeratingly whispered a few heartbeats later.

“First, he’s not an ‘it’. His name is Lucas.” Tony frowned at him, but Steve ignored that. “Second, how am I supposed to know? Guess we’ll find out when he wakes up.”

“What?” Tony sounded incredulous as Steve stood and made his way over to the kitchenette. “You - you’re just going to leave me here with - with - _Lucas_?”

So he had listened. Steve was slightly impressed. Judging by his behavior Steve had thought he’d been too preoccupied with the little creature sleeping on his chest to listen to what Steve had said.

“You’re doing good. He’s sleeping, you’re staying put.” Steve grinned at him. “Win-win in my books.”

Tony looked at him for a moment, face contemplating. “You are an evil man, Steve Rogers. Anyone ever tell you that?”

Steve’s smirk stayed, even as he turned around and busied himself with finding a pot and getting out a variety of cans. He thought maybe the next few days wouldn’t be so bad.

Lucas slept almost half an hour, about the time Steve needed to make them all dinner. He had struggled a little with the formula at first, but Tony had pointed out that the box probably had instructions printed on the side. It had.

They ate first, seeing as Lucas was still sleepy and more or less content lying on the floor on his blanket. Steve had helped Tony sit up straighter on the couch, making him press out a pained groan. He apologized, but the engineer waved him off. When they’d finished Steve figured it was Lucas’ turn to eat (though his stomach was still growling which earned him a scolding look from Tony that he ignored). Sitting on the floor cross-legged, Steve carefully arranged the baby on his lap and already wanted to pop the bottle’s nipple in his mouth, when Tony stopped him hesitantly.

“No, uhm.” He waved at Steve’s arms. “Hold him - with the head in the crook of your arm.”

“Lying down?” Steve asked, frowning, but doing as Tony instructed nevertheless. “Won’t he choke?”

“Well, I…” Tony’s voice trailed off, dragged a hand over his face, and if Steve didn’t know better he’d say he was embarrassed. “Rhodey’s niece. He always held her like that when he gave her the bottle.”

Steve raised his eyebrows at him, but all Tony did was huff and roll his eyes. “Look, I don’t know, okay? I was either pretty drunk or pretty hung-over whenever I saw him giving Hadley the bottle, but.” He held up his index finger. “I’m sure he didn’t have her sitting up while he fed her.”

Eyeing him for another moment, Steve slowly started to nod. Tony actually did sound sure about it and as much as he’d been acting like he didn’t care about the baby before, Steve saw him watching intently now as Lucas drank from the bottle. They both did, and in rapt silence. The little boy emptied it basically in one go. Steve had to say he was slightly impressed. He propped him up against his shoulder like he’d seen Mrs. Barnes do with Bucky’s little sisters all the time and gently patted his back.

Nevertheless, he still had something else to do.

“I’m going to sweep the perimeter again, see if anything comes up.” He wasn’t going to admit it, but he was still uncomfortable in the house. It didn’t seem to add up, and more to it, it smelled like a trap. And the thing with the baby, with Lucas, was also strange. Why leave a baby there? What were they trying to achieve with that? Where were his parents? It had to be a trap of some kind. And Steve was going to find out what they were up against here.

“You okay with the infant for that time?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Tony mumbled and opened his arms, welcoming, though it seemed to be more of an instinctual reaction than anything else. Steve didn’t think that Tony was fully conscious anymore and fought himself for a moment to give the baby over. In the end, though, he decided that with Tony was probably safer than on the floor. As Tony’s arms cautiously closed around the baby Steve knew he’d made the right decision.

He made his way outside and fought his way about a mile through the forest, searching loosely for any kind of lead, really, as to where they were stranded before heading back in concentric circles. Nothing. Safe for a lot of wood and trees and moss, there was nothing. They were completely alone and stranded in the middle of nowhere. The rapidly darkening sky hindered a wider search and being in a forest didn’t help either, so Steve headed back to the cabin.

It was still strange that there was a house here, in the middle of nowhere, with no car or other means of transport to get to the next city to buy food. And that there had been a small child left in the bathtub. Steve shuddered. He didn’t have a lot of experience with children, but abandoning one just like that was… He wasn’t going to think about that. They had found Lucas. He was safe now.

When he came back they were both fast asleep. The painkillers and the warm grub in his belly had probably knocked Tony out cold. Steve couldn’t help but smile. He gently picked up the sleeping infant and pillowed him in the crook of his arm again, finding a comfortable place to sit with his back against the couch. He wasn’t planning on sleeping tonight.

In the morning, when Tony woke up he furiously told Steve to hand over the baby and _get some fucking shut eye, Rogers_. Steve couldn’t argue with that. The previous day’s battle and pulling an all-nighter along with the little food he’d had, had taken its toll on him, although Lucas had woken quite often and demanded attention from him. Steve was out cold in a matter of moments.

After a couple of hours of light sleep he woke to Lucas’ babbling practically right in front of his face. He must’ve sunken down to the floor some time during his sleep and landed face first on the carpet. Right next to where Tony must’ve put the little one. He got slapped in the face a couple of times before he was awake enough to sit up. Right as he’d scanned the room, noticed Tony wasn’t there and felt his heart jump into his mouth, the door flew open and the man in question stumbled in on what appeared to be self-made crutches.

“Found the parents.”

“What, where?” Steve couldn’t help that his brain wasn’t fully awake yet.

Tony eyed him shortly, but obviously dismissed whatever he’d wanted to say first to explain. “Shed outside. Not very pretty.”

Steve felt a pang in his chest. That confirmed his worst fears: that Lucas was all alone in this world. It was a miracle they’d found him and that he’d been well for the most part.

He pushed himself up to sit on the couch instead of in front of it. “Why are you up anyway?”

Tony fell onto it besides him. “I was trying to find some tools. Someone needs to get our comms working again so the others can find us and get us out of here. I’m already sick of canned food.”

“Tony, we’ve not even been here for twenty-four hours,” Steve said with a levelled glance. On another note he added, “They’re going to find us. They’ve probably noticed by now that we haven’t returned to the Tower and won’t do so anytime soon, at least not in a reasonable time frame. I’m sure they’ve already started searching.”

The other man huffed, but didn’t comment on it. Instead he threw up his leg on the couch and onto Steve’s lap, seemingly unconcerned by his actions, but obviously relieved by taking off the pressure, judging by the groan that slipped out of his mouth and the way he sagged down into the cushions with closed eyes.

Steve studied him silently for a moment in awe and then asked, “How’s the pain going?”

Tony grinned, held up a little pill box and shook it meaningfully, still all with closed eyes. “These little buddies are working wonders, I’m telling you. Almost can’t feel my legs.” His face contorted in a grimace. “That’s… not what I wanted to convey.”

Steve grimaced, too, but in the end the grin won. “I can tell.” _These little buddies_ had clearly knocked his smart brain off quite well.

“They’re not as good as some scotch would be, though.” Tony sounded almost a little sorry.

Steve shrugged. “Wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a moonshining out back.”

Tony opened his left eye to glare at Steve suspiciously. “Don’t tease me, Rogers.”

Now Steve couldn’t keep up the serious look any longer. He knew Tony had his problems with alcohol, but he also knew he’d been on the wagon for more than two years now. Long enough to joke about it good-naturedly, certainly.

“And you’re working on the comms?” Steve changed the topic, for Tony’s sake more than for his. He seemed grateful for that.

“Yeah, getting to that once my hand is hurting a little less.”

Right, his right hand had taken a pretty bad hit after braking hard with it when his armor had been destroyed. It was a miracle actually that he hadn’t broken it, too.

“Take it easy. The others are working on it from their end and we’re good for a couple of days. Your brain won’t be of any use when you can’t implement that knowledge into working your magic.”

That made Tony sit up straighter. He threw him a strange look and Steve couldn’t help but feel his cheeks tinge red. With his fair Irish skin it probably showed rather prominently. And that… that… Thankfully Tony distracted.

“I took the liberty to dismantle your comms unit.” It sounded matter-of-fact, a straight cut to the emotional line their conversation had been going to. Steve let himself in for the change. “Couldn’t convince it to send out a distress signal, though, not without the right equipment. It’s why I went out to the shed in the first place.”

Their conversation was interrupted by a heartbreaking wail out of nowhere. Almost simultaneously Steve and Tony sat up straight and searched the floor for the little infant in their care.

Lucas had managed to roll over somehow and obviously wasn’t able to get back now. And in his distress he’d called out to his caretakers for help in form of ear-piercing crying.

“What’s wrong? Is it hurt? Is there blood?”

Tony couldn’t lean as far over as Steve and, for whatever reason, instantly panicked. Steve carefully stood up, mindful of Tony’s legs in his lap, and got down to pick the infant up, propping him against his shoulder to calm him. Though Steve pulled every trick in his not very thick book, the boy wouldn’t let himself be calmed down.

“Do you - is there a pacifier around here somewhere to plug him up?”

“Tony.” Steve probably gave him the Frown, a disapproving look the other Avengers kept insisting Steve had perfected, but he thought the situation justified it by all means. He could at least try to be understanding and use a less depreciating language.

“Didn’t find one yesterday.” He did stand up, though, and went to look again, Lucas’ cries a steady noise in his ear.

“Did you try the bathroom?” Tony commented helpfully as Steve went on to the kitchenette after raiding the dressers. He had not. For a second he debated simply ignoring the other man, but Lucas’ crying convinced him to jump over his shadow and just go for it. In the bathroom he actually did find a pacifier, but that didn’t do anything for him, not even a couple of minutes later.

Purposefully striding back into the room, Steve planted himself in front of the couch and Tony.

“What did you do?”

Tony blinked at him. “What did _I_-? I didn’t do anything! When he was whiny this morning I gave him another bottle - an implacable battle for both of us, by the way, and he went back to sleep right after!”

In the moment Steve wanted to bark out another accusation to that, he felt wetness on his arm, and it died in his throat with a sudden realization.

Diaper change.

Both men seemed to realize what was going on around the same time because Tony commented drily, “You’re dripping.”

Steve bit out that yes, he’d noticed that, turned around on his heel and shoved the bathroom door shut behind him with his hip, separating him and Lucas from Tony. Once inside Steve was at a loss, though. He might’ve witnessed Mrs. Barnes disappear often when Becca or her sisters had needed a change, but he’d never actually seen her do it. He figured, though, that lying Lucas down first seemed a good idea. He was Captain America, for God’s sake. The military prided itself with his skills as a master tactician. He could do this. Couldn’t be that hard, now, could it?

Carefully he undressed the infant, memorizing the way he was dressed and the diaper was wrapped to reproduce it later on. He got rid of the sullied clothes and used a wet towel to clean the boy up as best as he could. In the bathroom cabinet he found new diapers, of which he used one, before he realized those wouldn’t get them past two days, at the max, really. Enough time to think of a different solution, though. Then he went on to search for something new to wear for Lucas, but couldn’t find anything in the bathroom. With a grimace he noticed he would have to go back out into the room. He had seen a small stack of baby clothes in one of the dressers there.

Then he realized he was still in his peed-on uniform. But since he had to get out of it now to wash it, it was as good as any opportunity to raid the closets for something more comfy to wear. So with both he and Lucas half-dressed, he steeled himself for Tony’s comments before opening the door. Single-mindedly, he strode over to the dresser, mind set on ignoring Tony. He searched for an undershirt for Lucas first, but couldn’t find any. What he did find, though, was some kind of jumpsuit which he supposed was alright, too. Main point was he had on some kind of clothing, right?

He set Lucas down on the bed and carefully dressed him, although the little one kicked and thrashed about wildly in the process, obviously happy again. Steve might’ve felt a pearl or two of sweat roll down his neck, but he wasn’t going to admit that. Then he went on to find a shirt for himself. He was just raiding the dresser, looking for a shirt that might fit him, when he took notice of Tony’s stare. That he was going to ignore, he told himself again resolutely.

“Wow,” was the first thing Tony said. At least he’d had the decency to wait until Steve had put a shirt on, otherwise Steve was sure he’d seen that the blush went past his collar.

“What?”

“You’re really good at this.” Tony’s face said he actually hadn’t wanted to say any of that out loud, but now it was out there. Steve blushed. And there was even more coming out of the engineer’s mouth.

“No, seriously. Father material. Hadn’t thought you had it in you.”

“Just a good tactician,” Steve tried to play it down. He didn’t even look at Tony, busied himself with Lucas instead, picking him up and rocking him on his shoulder. The little guy had considerably calmed down, now that his personal needs had been met. It reminded him that it was probably time for another meal.

Tony had stated he wasn’t hungry, but Steve nevertheless made him eat a small portion, although he knew he was already sick and tired of canned food. He needed the strength, his body was fighting to heal itself, whether the food lived up to his standards or not. After getting another bottle into the infant Lucas slept peacefully in his arms. Figuring the baby wouldn’t mind where he slept, he put him into Tony’s lap.

“Whoa! Cap, what-“

“I’m going to walk the perimeter again,” Steve stated. Out of the corner of his eyes he saw his shield and shortly debated taking it with him as a means of defense, but figured he’d handle anything that might come up on his own.

“And dumping the brat with me - again? And here I thought you were father of the year.” Tony rolled his eyes, but draped the baby a little more comfortably. Lucas didn’t notice any of it; he just slept contently through it all.

Steve huffed at his dramatics. “Don’t you think it’s strange that the parents are dead in the shed while the baby is left alive in the house?”

Tony seemed to mull that over in his head for a moment. “When you phrase it like that, it does sound strange.”

Steve nodded. “So I’m going to search the grounds again. And I’ll take a look at the shed. What do you need?”

“What do I need?” Tony asked, clearly puzzled by the question.

“From the shed, Tony. I’ll get it for you. Tools, or…?”

“Oh.” He seemed surprised at the words coming out of Steve’s mouth. “Um… Anything you can find, really. I don’t know what I’ll need until I get to the bottom of why the comm is resisting my charms.”

“Maybe you should try talking it into submission.” Steve winked at him as he opened the door.

“Ha fucking ha!” He couldn’t help but smile at Tony’s deadpan tone as he got out to scout.

The grounds didn’t hold any news. They were still as alone as the day before. His round ended at the shed. For reasons he couldn’t fathom, Steve hesitated to open the door. Tony had already been in there, had seen what had happened to Lucas’ parents, and dubbed it ‘_not very pretty_’. On the other hand, Tony needed tools to repair their comms. They might hold out a couple of days, but they couldn’t stay here forever. And Steve was decidedly against going on the run of unknown proportions with an infant. They needed the tools. With another deep breath, he opened the door.

_Not pretty_ summed it up rather well. There was a lot of blood and a rope around a neck involved. Steve tried his best to ignore the scene, gathered what tools he could see and saw to it that he got back to the house.

Once back inside he declared, “I’m still not convinced that this isn’t a trap.”

Tony flinched, looking startled at Steve’s sudden appearance, and tossed the baby in his lap around enough to make him wail.

“Yo, keep it down! You’re scaring the brat.”

“I just can’t figure out,” Steve went on, ignoring what Tony had said, “why they would leave an infant behind. Why not kill the baby, too?”

Now Tony sat up fully, rearranging Lucas in his lap so that the baby wouldn’t fall off. “That’s harsh, Rogers.”

“No, think about it. If it was just about getting us trapped here, the cabin would have been enough. It’s shelter, it’s basically fully stocked - it’s a perfect hideout for a couple of days, especially if one or both of us are injured.” He made a pregnant pause to let Tony think about his words. “So. Why not kill the baby, too? It makes absolutely no sense.”

“Maybe they couldn’t do it.” Tony shrugged. “You don’t kill a baby every day.”

“Bad guys with a bad conscience?” Steve doubted that.

“Why are you even hurting your head over this?”

“I’m thinking about our safety here, Tony. Lucas is two months old, you have a broken leg. We certainly can’t _run_ should the need arise.”

“_Should the need arise_,” Tony repeated mockingly. “We’ve been here two days. Don’t you think if this was a set-up they would’ve sprung the trap by now?”

“I don’t know. We hit them pretty hard. Maybe they just haven’t been able to attack. Anyway, I’m not really keen on finding out.” Steve knew he was getting defensive and a little irritated, but that was just the reaction Tony Stark evoked from him most of the time.

“Right. Getting back to work. Nipper’s yours.”

Steve couldn’t follow all of Tony’s movements, but the result of it was that he suddenly had his own lap full of baby.

“I’m going to take another look at the comms.”

Steve had trouble not letting the infant fall to the floor. It took him about six heartbeats to get control of his own limbs and factor in Lucas’ own movements to finally have a safe stand again. Tony had hobbled over to the bed by then, where the remains of Steve’s comm unit lay, dismantled. Probably wouldn’t stay like that for long, though. Now that he had the appropriate tools he’d surely manage to get to the others in no time at all.

It was quiet for a rather long time safe for Tony’s unintelligible murmuring, though Steve was mainly focused on the infant in his arms, but then he heard the tell-tale sound of an electric shock caused by short circuit. Tony cursed.

“Damn it! That’s it! I’m gonna built a new one from scratch!”

And was out the door before Steve could react to it. He followed him with his eyes, but was only met with the closed door.

“Huh.” His glance wandered back to the bed, but couldn’t make sense of the parts lying around. “Seems like we’re on our own for now.”

The baby had woken up again and was thrashing about heavily, playing with the pacifier in his mouth from time to time, but seemed overall happy with that. Steve didn’t mind carrying him around, he wasn’t getting tired of it anyway, but for assembling them some kind of meal he’d need both hands. Looking around, the solution was quickly found and prepped. He hoped it was okay for a baby that tiny. It had been for most of his childhood years, but Steve’s childhood had by no standards been normal. Hopefully it didn’t need to be a more permanent solution.

In the middle of preparing their food, he heard Tony come back inside. He also noticed Tony stopped in the middle of the room, probably frowning.

“Where’s the tot?”

Yes, definitely frowning. That tone was usually accompanied by a frown on his forehead.

“Sleeping again.”

It was silent for a moment before Tony made a strange noise Steve couldn’t categorize.

“_In a drawer?_”

Okay, now Steve had to look up. Tony sounded nothing short of scandalized.

“What. Where else do you propose he should sleep, the floor? The drawer’s big enough, I padded it, he can’t fall out. What more do you want?”

Tony still looked incredulous, first at the baby in the drawer, then at Steve and back to the drawer.

“I bet you slept in a drawer,” he murmured and Steve couldn’t help but smirk.

“In fact, I did.”

Tony groaned. “God, Nat was right. You really are a fossil.”

“People made do with what they had, Tony. Just like we have to do until the others find us.” He turned back to the food shortly. “Did you get anywhere with getting out a signal?”

Still baffled, Tony seemed to slowly get over the fact that in the 1940s babies used to sleep in drawers. Steve faced him again and leaned his hip against the kitchenette, now stirring the stew in the pot sideways.

“Oh, yeah, uhm.” Tony motioned over the shoulder with his thumb. “Your unit was wrecked. But I found an old radio that I repurposed. The others are going to be here in a couple of hours.”

Thank God. Steve let out a relieved sigh.

“Yeah, I share the sentiment, Cap.” Tony hobbled over to the couch and let himself fall down with a grunt. A clear sign he’d been standing or walking around too long at a time. His leg was still broken and hadn’t been attended to professionally. He should probably take another round of medication.

Just as he’d thought it Tony got out the pill box and took some. His glance wandered back to the dresser again where Lucas was still peacefully sleeping, even through the ruckus they’d made.

“You seriously put the baby in a drawer.”

“You’re not going to let go of that anytime soon, are you?” Steve asked with a sigh on his lips.

Tony snorted out a laugh. “No, absolutely not.”

Before he could add anything more, Steve interrupted as a precaution. “You’re very welcome to tend to him while I get the food ready, if you’re not happy with how I handle him.”

“Ohhhh, no,” the other waved off. “Me and tiny human beings are not… usually not on the same page. It’s mutual, though - they don’t like me, I don’t like them, so.”

“Lucas seems to like you alright,” Steve commented.

Tony snorted. “Yeah, beggars can’t be choosers.”

Doubting that a two month old could consciously choose who they liked, Steve turned back to the stove and changed pots to warm up the water for Lucas’ bottle, letting the topic slide. Once everything was ready, Steve couldn’t help but smile a little.

“_Make every meal a happy, quiet time._”

“What?” Tony sounded actually surprised at his words, not mocking for once, just… curious.

“It’s what - my ma used to say that.” Steve couldn’t help but blush. Was that not common anymore? To want to have a quiet enjoyable meal together? He figured that of all the people out there, Tony Stark wouldn’t know such a thing.

“It’s nice,” was the only comment on Tony’s side. All through the meal he stayed quiet, didn’t once complain about the choice of food (though it wasn’t a choice, really; canned food was all they had), and even wordlessly got up and took care of the plates while Steve finished feeding Lucas.

They still had a couple of hours to kill, so after Lucas went back into the drawer and Tony onto the couch, Steve decided to take another look at the shed and more importantly the two corpses in there. Even though the shed was only a five minute walk away from the house he didn’t make it there. That is, he almost made it to the door, but heard some strange noises before his hand had even reached the handle. Quickly, Steve assessed the situation around him, tried to figure out what to do now. Or tried to, at least. A clip being emptied in his direction and all the bullets flying around his head blocked that plan a little.

Without hesitation Steve dashed back through the trees, back to the cabin, ripped the door open and slammed it back closed behind him. He didn’t wait as he made his way over to where he’d propped his shield against the wall.

“What’s wrong? Were those-?” Tony was already on high alert, and with good reason.

“Yes! I told you the deaths were staged!” Steve yelled.

“What?”

“This whole scene was staged! We need to get out of here - _now_!”

Grabbing the baby and his shield in one hand and the engineer in the other, Steve barely managed to get them out of the house before it blew up sky high, courtesy to a grenade, probably.

“Shit!” Tony pressed out, obviously realizing the gravity of the situation they had maneuvered themselves in. That summed it up pretty good, Steve thought absent-mindedly as he mapped out a route for them in his mind. Lucas was crying heartbreakingly in the crook of his arm and Steve knew he had probably grabbed him too tight, but he just wanted to make sure he didn’t let go of him. As he did to Tony. But Tony helped him along by clawing into his shoulder. Just like he’d done when they’d first arrived here.

It wasn’t easy handling all three of them and the shield on top. All Steve could really do was try not to get them shot. Basically, he had both hands full and needed to handle the shield at the same time which was not as easy as he’d made it look, probably. They were still shot at, though now the shooters seemed more mindful of where they put their bullets, not like before when Steve had been on the other end of a whole munition clip.

Steve just spotted an agglomeration of rocks they could hide behind and take a breather for a second when he heard the tell-tale sound. Thank God.

“Hey Stark,” it sounded through the trees and instant relief flooded Steve’s veins. “You miss me?”

A quinjet and Natasha in it. And that she was joking was a really good sign.

“Just get your job done, Romanoff,” Tony bit out lowly, too quietly for anyone besides Steve to hear, but he gathered that Natasha knew what to do anyway. And Steve let her do it gladly.

The whole stint was over before he knew it. Nat had brought back-up in form of their resident archer and together they rounded up the guys firing at them pretty good. Not half a minute later Steve decided to join in, too, dumping the infant in Tony’s lap yet again and dashing right back to the fight.

Once they’d stowed away the bad guys on the quinjet safely - the rest of the HYDRA unit that had attacked them in the first place - Steve got back to Tony to get him and Lucas in there, too.

The first thing Tony said to him when he was in earshot was a somehow detached sounding, “Take it off me.”

Steve frowned, but instantly knew what he was talking about. Lucas.

“Rogers. Please. He’s - he’s been crying all the time, just take him-“

“Okay.” He stretched out his arms and Tony somewhat pushed the baby away from him and into Steve’s range. The shield was somewhat in the way, but Steve still managed to prop the little guy up against his shoulder and tried to calm him down. Then he pulled Tony up and got all three of them into the jet where Clint’s surprised look greeted them.

“Whoa, what the hell are you-?”

“Oh, a squirt!” Natasha’s smile was nothing short of dangerous as she swiftly took the baby out of Steve’s hands and disappeared to the back. Was Steve a little concerned by that? Maybe. It must’ve shown on his face.

“Relax, Cap.” Clint’s hand fell down heavily on his shoulder. “She doesn’t look like it, but Nat’s a real natural with kids. Care to tell me how you came into possession of an infant? Or do I not want to know?”

“Debrief at the Tower,” Steve cut off any further discussion, at least for now. There would be a lot of that later on, though, he figured.

“Yeah, let’s just get back,” Tony agreed, still hanging off Steve’s arm. “I need a couple of happy pills stronger than simple Advil before we’re talking about this.”

**Author's Note:**

> Additional trigger warning for supposed suicide/murder (non of the main characters and in canon-typical fashion) and past alcoholism (which is canon for Tony Stark I think). I'd like to repeat that both are ONLY MENTIONED IN PASSING!
> 
> If you made it through, thanks for reading! Kudos and comments are what we writers thirst for, so leave one or both to let me know what you thought!


End file.
